FoxBase

The PC database programming language FoxBase+ is released in 1989. The product is developed by Bowling Green University professor Dave Fulton, beginning in 1984. The product is subsequently renamed FoxPro and becomes a huge commercial success. So successful, that Microsoft purchases FoxPro for $173 million in June 1992.
More Computer History

Computer Generated Pictures

The Howard Wise Gallery in New York City presents the first showing of computer generated art in 1965. The show is titled "Computer Generated Pictures" and features artists working with computers such as Manfred Mohr and Charles Csuri. The work is presented as wall work or as experimental film. Working with the theme, the announcements for the exhibition are made from computer cards.
More Computer History

Microsoft anti-trust

In June 1990, the Federal Trade Commission launches a probe into possible collusion between Microsoft and IBM. Eight years after the initial FTC probe, Microsoft is accused of anti-competitive acts and is sued for anti-trust violation. The verdict calls for the breakup of Microsoft. On June 28, 2001, after 4 1/2 years of litigation, Microsoft wins an appeal victory as the court throws out the breakup order.
More Computer History

EDS

Ross Perot establishes Electronic Data Systems (EDS) on June 27, 1962 by incorporating the company in the state of Texas for $1,000. EDS signs an agreement to buy unused time on Southwestern Life Insurance’s IBM 7070 mainframe computer. Two months and 78 sales calls later, Collins Radio in Cedar Rapids, Iowa becomes EDS’ first customer.
More Computer History

GPS

The final Navstar satellite is launched into orbit on June 26, 1993, completing a network of satellites known as the Global Positioning System. With a GPS receiver that costs a few hundred dollars, people are now able to instantly know their location on the planet - latitude, longitude, and altitude - to within a few hundred feet. The GPS system is controlled by the Department of Defense and can be used by anyone, free of charge.
More Computer History

Gateway

Gateway is founded in 1985 in an Iowa farmhouse. Starting with a $10,000 loan from his grandmother, a rented computer and a three-page business plan, Ted Waitt turns Gateway into one of America's best known computer brands. The company is known by its distinctive cow-spotted boxes. Today, Gateway is among the top computer companies worldwide.
More Computer History

Hayes-Compatible

Dennis C. Hayes invents the PC modem in 1977. The new communication device for the PC is critical technology that allows the Internet to eventually emerge and grow. The Hayes Communications company establishes the de facto standard for microcomputer modems being aptly described as "Hayes-Compatible."
More Computer History

ASCII

The American Standards Association publishes the American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) in 1963. ASCII codes are used to standardize data exchange among computers, communications equipment, and control devices. ASCII is adopted by all U.S. computer manufacturers except IBM, which develops a proprietary character code for its mainframe computers.
More Computer History

J.C.R. Licklider

"It seems reasonable to envision a 'thinking center' that will incorporate the functions of present-day libraries. With the anticipated advances in information storage and retrieval, the picture readily enlarges itself into a network of such centers, connected to one another and to individual users by wide-band communication lines." J.C.R. Licklider, 1960.
More Computer History

Sand Hill Road

Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park, California is notable for its concentration of venture capital companies. Its significance as a symbol of private equity in the United States is matched only by that of Wall Street. For several years during the Dot com boom of the late 1990s, commercial real-estate on Sand Hill Road was more expensive than anywhere else in the United States.
More Computer History

FCC

The Federal Communications Commission is created by U.S. Congress in June 1934. A month later, the FCC begins merging regulations from the Federal Radio Commission, the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Postmaster General into one agency. Today, the agency has extensive oversight of new communications technologies, such as satellite, microwave, and private radio communications.
More Computer History

The Webmaster

The job title Webmaster originates in the mid 1990s as companies look to hire the necessary personnel capable of deploying and maintaining a website. The Webmaster job has very broad responsibilities such as information architecture, designing and developing web pages, web scripting and programming, and overseeing the management of e-commerce capabilities.
More Computer History

Silicon Valley of India

The city of Bangalore is called the "Silicon Valley" of India. The capital of the State of Karnataka and is home to over 6 million people. Since technology giant Texas Instruments discovered its potential as a high-tech city in the early 1980s, Bangalore has seen a major technology boom. It is now home to several hundred high-tech companies, including homegrown companies Wipro and Infosys.
More Computer History

The Moog Synthesizer

Dr. Robert A. Moog creates the first playable and reconfigurable music synthesizer in 1963. Wendy Carlos's 1968 album "Switched on Bach" is produced entirely by using Moog's synthesizer. Many popular music artists begin using the Moog. In 1971, Moog breaks into the mass market with the Minimoog Model D, an all-in-one instrument interfaced with a keyboard.
More Computer History

The Computer Store

Dick and Lois Heiser see the newly released Altair microcomputer at a Southern California computer show in the summer of 1975. The Heisers begin selling the Altair and later open The Arrow Head Computer Co. doing business as The Computer Store in Santa Monica, California. The Heiser's store is the first independent retail computer store in the United States.
More Computer History

CP/M

Gary Kildall completes the Control Program/Monitor (CP/M) operating system in 1974. The system is remarkably simple, reliable, and well suited to the limited microcomputers of the day. He sells it himself through the newly formed company Digital Research. The highly popular CP/M operating system is the standard on most PCs until it is eventually eclipsed by MS DOS.
More Computer History

The first commercial microprocessor

Intel engineer Federico Faggin leads the design of the first commercial microprocessor in 1970. Working into the early morning, Faggin successfully tests the critical functions of his 4004 chip design. The 4004 chip revolutionizes the integrated circuit by placing all the parts of a computer --the central processing unit, input and output controls, and memory-- onto one small chip.
More Computer History

Lee De Forest's vacuum tube

American inventor and physicist Lee De Forest develops the vacuum tube triode in 1906. The triode is a three terminal device that allows him to develop an amplifier for audio signals, making AM radio possible. The vacuum tube triode also helps push the development of computers forward as the tubes are used in several computer designs in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
More Computer History

The first computer screensaver

Berkeley Systems develops one of the first computer screensaver programs in 1989. The screensaver is designed to prevent image burning on monitors when a computer is left running or unused for long periods. Berkeley's product includes its most famous screen saver - the Flying Toasters - which features art deco styled chrome toasters with bird-like wings, flying in formation across the screen.
More Computer History

UNIX

Bell Labs programmers Dennis Ritchie and Kenneth Thompson develop the UNIX operating system in spring of 1970. UNIX uses many of the time-sharing and file-management features previously developed with the Multics project at Bell. The Bell Labs Patent Department is the first group to use the UNIX operating system.
More Computer History

The Step Reckoner

German mathematician and philosopher Gottfried von Leibniz introduces the Step Reckoner in 1671. This mechanical device performs addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, as well as square roots by a series of stepped additions.
More Computer History

SETI@home

SETI@home is introduced to the public on June 8, 1998. SETI@home is a scientific experiment that uses Internet-connected computers in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Users participate by downloading and running a free software screen saver program that provides unused CPU cycles from their computers for the project. SETI@home is based in Berkeley, California.
More Computer History

Internet search engines

The first Internet search engines are developed in 1990. University of McGill student Alan Emtage develops the first search engine for the Internet in 1990. The search engine is called Archie and is designed to search and archive documents available on the Internet. A year later, Paul Lindner and Mark McCahill develop another search application called Gopher at the University of Minnesota.
More Computer History

Bill Gates

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates becomes the wealthiest person in the world in 1997. At the age of 41, William H. Gates III tops everyone with an estimated net worth of nearly forty billion dollars. His fantastic run begins with the development of a BASIC language interpreter for the Altair microcomputer in 1975.
More Computer History

The Osborne 1

The Osborne 1 is released in 1981 and is considered to be the first portable computer. The computer features a 5-inch display, 64K of memory, a modem, and two 5 1/4-inch floppy disk drives. The twenty-four pound machine sells for $1,795 and comes with the CPM operating system, SuperCalc spreadsheet application and WordStar word processing application.
More Computer History

Xerox

The Haloid Company is founded in 1906 to manufacture and sell photographic paper. Haloid acquires Chester Carlson's Xerography license in 1947 and sells the first xerographic copier in 1950. In 1958, the company changes its name to Haloid Xerox, and three years later, to Xerox Corporation.
More Computer History

Mobile telephone service

The first commercial mobile telephone service begins in June 1946. A driver in St. Louis, Missouri uses a handset from under his car's dashboard to place the world's first mobile telephone call. A team from Bell Labs works for more than a decade to develop the service. By 1948, mobile telephone service is available in almost 100 cities and 30,000 calls are being made each week.
More Computer History

Biggest computer hacker

Gary McKinnon, described as the world's biggest computer hacker, is arrested in June 2005. The unemployed computer engineer is accused of causing $1 billion in damage by breaking into the most secure computers at the Pentagon and NASA. McKinnon allegedly breaks into the networks from his home computer to try to prove his theory that the United States is covering up the existence of UFO's.
More Computer History

Open Directory Project

Rich Skrenta sets out in spring of 1998 to create the web's most comprehensive directory. By late June, there are 200 editors, 27,000 sites, and 2,000 categories on what is dubbed the "GnuHoo" directory. Netscape acquires GnuHoo in 1998 and subsequently renames it the Open Directory Project. Today, this directory is the largest directory on the web and is used by more than twenty major search engines.
More Computer History